DSM-5: The Problem with Too Much Power

Gary Greenberg on the Issue with DSM Disorders

You don’t author a book titled The Book of Woe: The DSM and the Unmaking of Psychiatry without having at least a few reservations about the DSM.

The practice of psychiatric diagnosis is one that exists somewhere between hard and soft science, lacking the authority of the former and the flexibility of the latter. But Gary argues that the link between DSM disorders and access to funding has given the manual a power it was never intended to have—to name and categorize human suffering.

In this video clip from the Networker Webcast series The Uproar Over DSM-5, Gary talks about how the DSM has come to dominant psychology.